CHAPTER 20
Irene's Clue
That same morning early, the princess woke in a terrible fright. Therewas a hideous noise in her room--creatures snarling and hissing androcketing about as if they were fighting. The moment she came toherself, she remembered something she had never thought of again--whather grandmother told her to do when she was frightened. Sheimmediately took off her ring and put it under her pillow. As she didso she fancied she felt a finger and thumb take it gently from underher palm. 'It must be my grandmother!' she said to herself, and thethought gave her such courage that she stopped to put on her daintylittle slippers before running from the room. While doing this shecaught sight of a long cloak of sky-blue, thrown over the back of achair by the bedside. She had never seen it before but it wasevidently waiting for her. She put it on, and then, feeling with theforefinger of her right hand, soon found her grandmother's thread,which she proceeded at once to follow, expecting it would lead herstraight up the old stair. When she reached the door she found it wentdown and ran along the floor, so that she had almost to crawl in orderto keep a hold of it. Then, to her surprise, and somewhat to herdismay, she found that instead of leading her towards the stair itturned in quite the opposite direction. It led her through certainnarrow passages towards the kitchen, turning aside ere she reached it,and guiding her to a door which communicated with a small back yard.Some of the maids were already up, and this door was standing open.Across the yard the thread still ran along the ground, until it broughther to a door in the wall which opened upon the Mountainside. When shehad passed through, the thread rose to about half her height, and shecould hold it with ease as she walked. It led her straight up themountain.
The cause of her alarm was less frightful than she supposed. Thecook's great black cat, pursued by the housekeeper's terrier, hadbounced against her bedroom door, which had not been properly fastened,and the two had burst into the room together and commenced a battleroyal. How the nurse came to sleep through it was a mystery, but Isuspect the old lady had something to do with it.
It was a clear warm morning. The wind blew deliciously over theMountainside. Here and there she saw a late primrose but she did notstop to call upon them. The sky was mottled with small clouds.
The sun was not yet up, but some of their fluffy edges had caught hislight, and hung out orange and gold-coloured fringes upon the air. Thedew lay in round drops upon the leaves, and hung like tiny diamondear-rings from the blades of grass about her path.
'How lovely that bit of gossamer is!' thought the princess, looking ata long undulating line that shone at some distance from her up thehill. It was not the time for gossamers though; and Irene soondiscovered that it was her own thread she saw shining on before her inthe light of the morning. It was leading her she knew not whither; butshe had never in her life been out before sunrise, and everything wasso fresh and cool and lively and full of something coming, that shefelt too happy to be afraid of anything.
After leading her up a good distance, the thread turned to the left,and down the path upon which she and Lootie had met Curdie. But shenever thought of that, for now in the morning light, with its faroutlook over the country, no path could have been more open and airyand cheerful. She could see the road almost to the horizon, alongwhich she had so often watched her king-papa and his troop comeshining, with the bugle-blast cleaving the air before them; and it waslike a companion to her. Down and down the path went, then up, andthen down and then up again, getting rugged and more rugged as it went;and still along the path went the silvery thread, and still along thethread went Irene's little rosy-tipped forefinger. By and by she cameto a little stream that jabbered and prattled down the hill, and up theside of the stream went both path and thread. And still the path grewrougher and steeper, and the mountain grew wilder, till Irene began tothink she was going a very long way from home; and when she turned tolook back she saw that the level country had vanished and the roughbare mountain had closed in about her. But still on went the thread,and on went the princess. Everything around her was getting brighterand brighter as the sun came nearer; till at length his first rays allat once alighted on the top of a rock before her, like some goldencreature fresh from the sky. Then she saw that the little stream ranout of a hole in that rock, that the path did not go past the rock, andthat the thread was leading her straight up to it. A shudder ranthrough her from head to foot when she found that the thread wasactually taking her into the hole out of which the stream ran. It ranout babbling joyously, but she had to go in.
She did not hesitate. Right into the hole she went, which was highenough to let her walk without stooping. For a little way there was abrown glimmer, but at the first turn it all but ceased, and before shehad gone many paces she was in total darkness. Then she began to befrightened indeed. Every moment she kept feeling the thread backwardsand forwards, and as she went farther and farther into the darkness ofthe great hollow mountain, she kept thinking more and more about hergrandmother, and all that she had said to her, and how kind she hadbeen, and how beautiful she was, and all about her lovely room, and thefire of roses, and the great lamp that sent its light through stonewalls. And she became more and more sure that the thread could nothave gone there of itself, and that her grandmother must have sent it.But it tried her dreadfully when the path went down very steep, andespecially When she came to places where she had to go down roughstairs, and even sometimes a ladder. Through one narrow passage afteranother, over lumps of rock and sand and clay, the thread guided her,until she came to a small hole through which she had to creep. Findingno change on the other side, 'Shall I ever get back?' she thought, overand over again, wondering at herself that she was not ten times morefrightened, and often feeling as if she were only walking in the storyof a dream. Sometimes she heard the noise of water, a dull gurglinginside the rock. By and by she heard the sounds of blows, which camenearer and nearer; but again they grew duller, and almost died away.In a hundred directions she turned, obedient to the guiding thread.
At last she spied a dull red shine, and came up to the mica window, andthence away and round about, and right, into a cavern, where glowed thered embers of a fire. Here the thread began to rise. It rose as highas her head and higher still. What should she do if she lost her hold?She was pulling it down: She might break it! She could see it far up,glowing as red as her fire-opal in the light of the embers.
But presently she came to a huge heap of stones, piled in a slopeagainst the wall of the cavern. On these she climbed, and soonrecovered the level of the thread only however to find, the nextmoment, that it vanished through the heap of stones, and left herstanding on it, with her face to the solid rock. For one terriblemoment she felt as if her grandmother had forsaken her. The threadwhich the spiders had spun far over the seas, which her grandmother hadsat in the moonlight and spun again for her, which she had tempered inthe rose-fire and tied to her opal ring, had left her--had gone whereshe could no longer follow it--had brought her into a horrible cavern,and there left her! She was forsaken indeed!
'When shall I wake?' she said to herself in an agony, but the samemoment knew that it was no dream. She threw herself upon the heap, andbegan to cry. It was well she did not know what creatures, one of themwith stone shoes on her feet, were lying in the next cave. But neitherdid she know who was on the other side of the slab.
At length the thought struck her that at least she could follow thethread backwards, and thus get out of the mountain, and home. She roseat once, and found the thread. But the instant she tried to feel itbackwards, it vanished from her touch. Forwards, it led her hand up tothe heap of stones--backwards it seemed nowhere. Neither could she seeit as before in the light of the fire. She burst into a wailing cry,and again threw herself down on the stones.